The Birth of Bane (10 page)

It was something
that didn’t include
him
.

As time passed,
even the house itself seemed to form an opinion in congruence with
this notion.

Less than
twenty-four hours after the microwave “beeped” at him angrily, my
father came home from work to find the front door unwilling to
open, though he’d used his keys to disengage both the knob-lock and
the dead-bolt.

I’d been sitting
on the upper portion of the deck in my pajamas, but bundled within
my mother’s crocheted afghan against the cold of the night. I’d
been devouring the latest Stephen King novel my mother espoused was
a must read. Of course, it was late, which was probably why his
raving at the front door came to my attention despite the
distance.

My
m
om had taken Eli upstairs to
his room to tuck him in. It was their custom for her to tell him
old stories. Whether about Native American Indians or tales of our
family generations ago, Elijah loved them all. It wouldn’t be an
exaggeration to say sometimes she spent a whole hour with him,
speaking in low tones as he stared off at the wall, his mind as far
from reality as the story unfolded within his impressionable
mind.

Valerie had gone
to bed twenty minutes prior, dead to the world once her head hit
the pillow.

So, the house
had been quiet when all of a sudden, My dad’s slurred yells reached
my ears.

I got up,
annoyed.
Didn’t the jerk have
his keys with him?
I remember
thinking as I made my way through the sliding glass doors and the
sunroom beyond. As I came into the living room, the entire front
portion of the house shook suddenly as my father yanked upon the
door ferociously.

“
Motherfucken, ass-grabbin’, two-balled bitch!”
I heard his muffled holler through the
thick wood of the portal.

I increased my
pace, striding through the dining room as Valerie poked her head
out from her bedroom. Her hair was skewed to one side as though
held fast in a strong wind, her face was bunched, eyes squinting
against the lamplight. I glanced her way with a weary shake of my
head.

Her upper lip
furled with an unbecoming snarl as she sank back into the depths of
her room, muttering under her breath.

“
What the fuck is wrong with you!”
my father was saying, gnashing through the rabid-like
saliva of a man too far in his cups.

I opened the
door, the knob turning easily in my grasp, the hinges sliding
smoothly. It was, after all, unlocked.

My
d
ad’s eyes gaped for a second,
seeing I had unbarred the way without issue, then the accusatory
gleam in his eye I was more than familiar with settled behind his
gaze. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” he rasped.

I was
immediately affronted.
What the
-. I didn’t do anything.

He didn’t
hesitate. “Why would you hold the door shut against me?” His finger
was pointing at my chest.

“
What are you
talking about? I was on the deck reading,” I tried.

His face was a
mask of fury now. “No, you weren’t!”

“
Yes, I was,” I
beseeched, my hands at either side, palms up.

“
Bullshit,
Jerry! You were fucking holding the door shut, so I couldn’t come
in.” He glared at me through his bushy, salt and pepper eyebrows,
his head angling to one side as though he couldn’t control its’
movement. “I know this, because I unlocked the motherfucker
beforehand.”

“
Dad,” I said,
attempting rationality, “I was on the deck. No one was holding the
door.”

He came within a
foot of me, his acrid breath filling my nostrils. He was rank with
drink. “You wanna play games with me, you sonofabitch?”

My eyes found
his.
I’m not your
wife…

“
You wanna fuck
with me?” He leaned even closer. I felt a heavy finger poke me in
the chest and stay.

I leaned into
the pressure, my eyes boring into his. “I. Was. On. The. Deck.” I
was hot of a sudden. Perspiration beaded my forehead and upper lips
so fast, I was damp before I knew it.

For a second, I
thought he was going to head-butt me. I saw the idea of it flash
across his orbs like a wisp of smoke blown aside by the cold wind
of hate. But, he didn’t. Instead, he turned his shoulders to the
side and slid passed me. “You better watch yourself, Jeremiah. One
of these days I’m gonna fuck you up.”

My chest was on
fire. My eyes never left him. My tongue felt like sandpaper in my
mouth. My spit had gone dry.

My mother came
from upstairs, walking briskly through the kitchen. “What’s going
on?”

My mouth twisted
with an overburdened scowl. It stopped her in her
tracks.

“
You better get
your delinquent son in line, Pillar. He’s cruisin’ for a bruisin’,”
warned my dad just before he strode into the master suite and
slammed the door.

My
m
om and I looked after him for a
spell, then shared a tired stare.

It was my mother
who broke the silence. “Come on, son. Let’s go to bed.”

We began to
button-up the house for the night.

From there, she
led me to my room and tucked me into bed – something she hadn’t
done in ages. She sat on the side of the bed once I was under the
covers, her hand reaching out to brush at the short hairs
protruding from the top of my head. “I love you,” she
said.

I could barely
hear her, but I had. “I love you too, mommy.”

I was asleep
before the soft touch of her fingertips left me.

*****

Within a week,
my father began to complain the house was cold, though, to the rest
of us, it was warm, comfortable even. He would turn up the
thermostat until it was near-sweltering, going on long tirades over
the “draftiness” of the house.

“
You better this place in order!” he’d yell at my mom, standing
over the floor heater next to the massive fireplace in the living
room, shivering. “You better get those motherfucken contractors in
line, you stupid cow. It’s colder than a witch’s tit in Alaska in
here!” He’d paused, pulling the throw-blanket about his shoulders
tighter about his person. “What the fuck am I paying for, if you
can’t make those sons-a-bitches do what they’re supposed to be
doing? How in the fuck are we
ever
going to sell this
hell-hole, if we can’t figure out how to heat it properly. Jesus
Christ, you’re a stupid motherfucker!”

He’d go on and
on, an unending diatribe about the chill, always deriding my
mother, always using his most vulgar language, even when Eli was
around. Sometimes, he’d call out when no one was around, just to
hear himself talk. That was my guess, because after a while we
tuned him out. We went about our business as he stood atop the
grate of the heater talking shit the entire time.

It was relief
when he was at work, when he was fucking Roxanna. It least then
there was peace and quiet.

*****

The time we
spent together, Myra and I put to good use. We decided to back off
the whole “sex thing” for the time being, despite the fact neither
of us felt our first attempt was “botched” in any way. Our physical
incompatibility was funny to us, which was how she and I typically
dealt with anything touchy or potentially embarrassing through the
years.

Instead, we used
it as a means to get to know one another on more levels than we
probably would’ve if it hadn’t hurt her so much and we’d gone at it
like a couple of monkeys in a tree. Don’t get me wrong. We weren’t
suddenly saints, walking the streets, handing out blessings to the
masses and such. We still found time to shed our clothing and
explore, taking our time with things we had rushed in the past. We
were learning. We had fun. I was beginning to understand there was
a lot more to Myra Arroyo than I had first anticipated. Yeah, she
might be crude at times, a little off beat with her sexual
tendencies and total lack of self-consciousness when it came to
anything involving her body, but that didn’t in any way translate
to a lack of depth. Myra was a deep well just like so many other
women I’ve come to know along the path of my life. She just hid the
fact she was like all the others of her gender better than most.
Only those who were special to her got to see what she was really
made of.

I was glad. I
took the time to want to know her. I felt blessed that she felt
comfortable enough to express it to me.

After one such
Saturday afternoon in my room, I’d been sitting amongst some of the
new wicker furniture my mother had purchased for the screened-in
portion of the front porch. I was ruminating over my girlfriend
when Valerie walked out through the front door, a book in hand. I
felt her gaze upon me, but didn’t want to rouse myself from
thoughts of my girl.

“
You really like
her, huh?” asked my sister, after a time.

My eyes met
hers, a smile of acquiescence plain upon my lips.

“
Stupid
question?” she queried for a second time, opening the screen door
and taking a seat in an identical chair.

“
Not stupid,
sis,” I said as I watched her come nearer. “Obvious might be a
better word.”

She huffed,
chortling. “Just don’t get all caught up in the mix.” There was a
thread of sisterly concern attached.

“
What
‘mix’?”

“
She’s just a
little ‘looser’ than the other girls you’ve dated,” she said as a
matter of fact, opening her book where she’d marked it. Then, she
stopped to peer directly into my eyes. “There’s more to us girls
than what’s between our legs.”

Her candidness
made me laugh out loud.

“
What?” she
asked through her bangs, her eyebrows rising.

“
You’re too
funny sometimes, sis.”

“
Don’t forget
what I said.”

Chuckling, I
replied: “I won’t.” Valerie had never shown concern in the past,
especially of this nature.

I was beginning
to wonder if there was more to 1052 Lincoln Drive than I could’ve
dreamed. We were all changing. Whether we realized it or not, we
were.

*****

That Tuesday,
when Valerie and I got home from school, my mother came running
down the stairs to meet us halfway between the street and the
house.

Immediately, I
was scared. I figured my father had come home early and had done
something to her, because her face was streaked with dirt, her
hands were filthy and there were cobwebs in her long, straight
black hair. But, I was wrong.

She led Valerie
by the hands and beckoned me to follow.

When we reached
the patio below the kitchen windows, she sat down on one of the two
stairs, pulling my sister down with her. I remained standing a few
feet away. The slope of the hill was such that my head was only a
foot and a half above there’s.

“
What’s this
about, mom?” asked Valerie, her petite brow furling.

My mother
actually giggled like a schoolgirl.

My sister and I
exchanged a glance, eyes a little wide with surprise.

“
Last night,”
began my mother, bun-walking upon the concrete, moving closer
toward Valerie. She held both of my sister’s hands within hers. “I
had this dream - this very vivid dream. I was walking around the
yard, looking for things to weed or prune or cut back. You know
just aimlessly walking about with some gardening shears in my hand
like we all do from time to time, right?” She laughed. It was a
joke. Only she walked about the property with shears in her
hand.

I
shrugged.

Valerie merely
nodded for her to continue.

“
I came across
this succulent plant that had been trampled or purposely broken,
and bent down to replant some of the shoots back into the ground.
All of a sudden, I hear this crystalline tinkling, a metallic
twinkling like wind chimes, only deeper as if the chime itself was
very large. It was far away or muffled, because it was just on the
edge of hearing.

“
So, I stood up,
trying to get a fix on it. I could tell it hadn’t come from the
surrounding area. It didn’t sound like it was carrying on the wind.
I took a few steps and heard it again, knowing I was correct. It
wasn’t coming from the yard or the street. It was coming from
inside the house.

“
The moment I
think this, I know it’s the truth, because I can feel it inside.”
She was touching her chest, above her breasts.

I was trying to
understand, but I couldn’t grasp what she was talking about. I’d
never felt
that
certain about anything
before.

Her soft eyes
touched both of us. “I ran to the house and stepped into the dining
room. I think the front door was wide open, but I don’t remember
exactly. The chime sounds again. This time, and I think it’s
because I’m indoors now, I can actually tell what direction it’s
coming from.” The light of the afternoon sun shone through her
pupils. “It was upstairs…